


What Now?

by BadassCompany



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Comfort, Cuddling, Feelings, First Kiss, Fluff, Grumpy Dean, Hurt/Comfort, Intimacy, Love, Loving Castiel, M/M, Sick Dean, Vulnerability, physical touch
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-19
Updated: 2016-12-19
Packaged: 2018-09-09 20:55:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,836
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8911630
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BadassCompany/pseuds/BadassCompany
Summary: Castiel cares for Dean while he's sick. What will happen when he gets better, after all the things they shared?"Dean was bursting with everything he wanted to say, his heart thrumming I love you like a tiny hummingbird, but he could only gasp against Cas’ lips and drink him in, one glorious, boundless 'what now'?"





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Jennilah](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jennilah/gifts).



> Super happy to be taking place in the Destiel Secret Santa! Hope you enjoy it :) <3

Dean couldn’t believe it. He’s been bruised, bloodied, and broken, and now, as he stared up at the ceiling with a dry mouth, he felt painfully clearly the indignity of his situation.

He had a cold.

He ached everywhere and when he tried to focus his eyes, his head pounded and his vision grew dim at the edges. When he tried to sit up, his limbs went weak and wobbly and he collapsed back on his pillows with an angry huff.

It was absurd, really, after so many bullets and scars, that he should come down with a _cold_ , of all things.

If he was being sensible, maybe he would have called for Sam to bring him some breakfast, a glass of water, some multivitamins or some shit, but he didn’t want to. Instead, he crossed his arms over his chest, pretending like it didn’t make it harder to breathe, and lay there, glaring at the ceiling. The sheets and blankets were tangled uncomfortably around his legs and waist, but he didn’t move. It was as if he thought by sheer force of will, he could become well.

Eventually, he was so bored and his throat was so dry, that he turned onto his side and made to slide off the bed and onto his feet. The plan, however, failed miserably and after a terrible moment of heartstopping panic as he couldn’t control his legs, Dean landed on the floor with a _thud._ He groaned loudly, letting his head tip back against the bed. Now his ass ached.

“Dean?” A deep voice enquired from outside his door. It was Cas. “Are you all right?”

“Fine,” Dean snapped hastily. The last thing he wanted was to be seen in his embarrassing predicament.

Dean’s door squeaked as it swung open, a sliver of light appearing as Cas peered around the edge of it.

“Goddamnit Cas, how many times do I have to tell you to knock?” Dean muttered, futilely trying to draw the sheets up around him, to hide himself.

Cas frowned. “At least I used the door this time.” He did have a point. Ordinarily Dean just woke up to the angel staring at him, having teleported inside. “Why are you on the floor?” He tilted his head, staring at Dean like an animal inside a zoo exhibit. Perhaps he thought this was some human custom he had interrupted.

“It helps me think.” Dean bit out savagely, not thinking at all.

“What are you thinking about?” Cas asked, walking closer. The floorboards creaked.

“Screw you,” Dean responded, turning away and smothering his face in the blanket. A moment later, a hand alighted on his shoulder,  Cas’ long fingers pressing gently down through the material of his worn black t-shirt.

“You’re sick,” Cas said. Dean was silent. The angel sighed, and after a moment picked Dean up. It happened so fast, all in one fell swoop, and he was off the floor and in Cas’ arms. He glanced into Cas’ eyes, big and blue and full of way too much feeling. “What the-” he started to protest, but at the sad twitch of Cas’ lip, he broke off.

A tiny thought had begun to kindle in the back of his mind. Would it be _so_ bad, just this once, to let Cas take care of him? Hell, maybe it’d even be good for Cas too, directionless as he was after everything with Lucifer, to be able to do something good. Besides all his weak rationale, Cas was warm and solid and he smelled like rain and everything Dean was too weak to resist right now. Dean slumped into him.

Cas stared down at him solemnly. After a moment, he seemed to realize that the moment had stretched on too long and was on the verge of breaking. He bent down and laid Dean on the bed far too gently. Dean gazed up at him as he muddled with the sheets, trying to neaten them up but unsure which way around they went, laying them rumpled over Dean’s body.

“Some day, I’m gonna teach you how to make a damn bed,” Dean said, just to break the awful, sickly sentimental silence.

Cas smiled a little. “Alright.”

There it was again. The silence that beat like a heart, _dadum, dadum,_ saying entirely too much.

Cas sat down on the bed, and ran a hand over Dean’s forehead. Dean let his eyes flutter closed. “Let me get you some water,” Cas said, and cold air swept in where his hand had rested. Dean sighed. He kept his eyes closed, the brightness of the room too much for him, listening to Cas’ footsteps in the hallway. Cas returned after a few moments, and propped Dean’s neck up under a firm hand, tipping the cold glass to his lips. Dean lapped up the water weakly, and he felt himself falling, falling away no matter how firmly Cas held him.

 

When he awoke, it was dark outside, and he shivered something awful. “Fuck,” he whimpered, when had it got so goddamn cold? The only source of heat in the room were fingers, stroking the side of his face and playing idly through his hair, little licks of lifegiving fire. Dean blindly pushed his head up into the warmth. “Cas?” he croaked.

“Yes,” Cas whispered, and his voice sounded strained. Dean tried to blink his eyes open, but they ached as soon as he did so. “Don’t,” Cas murmured shortly, and a cool, dripping cloth was laid across his eyes, encasing everything in a layer of cool, black velvet. Dean twitched his hand from where it clutched the blanket, looking for something, reassurance, warmth, maybe.

Cas wrapped his hand around Dean’s, his thumb playing over the knuckles. Dean shivered, and not entirely from the cold. He wanted to bury himself in Cas’ light, lingering touches.

“Cas,” he said again, voice cracked and broken, “I’m cold.”

It felt like he’d confessed something just then, like he’d laid everything bare and opened himself up to a world of hurt far beyond the words ‘I’m cold’ implied.

He felt Cas’ weight shifting on the bed next to him and then arms wrapping around his waist, hesitantly pulling him closer. Dean let out a soft, incoherent sound which was probably meant to be something along the lines of ‘finally’. He closed his eyes and melted into Cas’ warmth, dark and sweet, letting the circles Cas rubbed on his back lull him to sleep.

 

Cas was talking, he realized absentmindedly, drifting back up to the surface of oblivion. Whispering, but loud enough to be heard in the night-time stillness. At least, he assumed it was night. It was dark everywhere and he could scarcely make out the outline of Cas’ face.

After listening to Cas talk for a while, Dean still had no idea what he was saying. He was talking in fragments, disjointed moments, speckled through with Enochian words, spoken in a different tone, one that curled with sweetness. “You know, when I told you I would always come when you call… I wish I had meant like this. El Aziazor.” He murmured on and on, and Dean was breathless in his arms, not wanting to say anything lest Cas stop talking. “It’s been said that the moment I laid a hand on you, I was lost. Vaoan. I like being lost.”

Dean’s breath betrayed him, hitching thick in his throat.

Cas was silent for a moment. Then, “Hello, Dean.”

Their legs were tangled together and while all the reasons it was a bad idea to be like this were coming back, he didn’t want to move. He could feel Cas’ chest rising and falling and wanted to drink his breath in, memorize just how this felt for every lonely, hard day on the road.

“Hey,” he whispered into the collar of Cas’ chest.

“You were very sick,” Cas mumbled. “Delirious at points.”

“It was just a cold,” Dean protested weakly.

“You talk in your sleep,” Cas continued as if Dean hadn’t spoken. “You say my name.”

Dean bit his lip. Chose to ignore what Cas had just said. Dusky gray light was spreading into the room from under the door. “What day is it?”

“Tuesday,” Cas answered lightly.

“But that’s…”

“Three days.”

Dean blinked.

“You’re almost better now,” Cas informed him, voice gravelly with morning.

“Thank you.” Dean said shyly, letting the words tumble off his tongue in a rush.

“Of course.” Dean could have cried out with the sense of loss when Cas sat up and disentangled himself from Dean. The curve of his waist, where Cas’ arm had draped, felt raw and exposed.

“I’ll get you something from the kitchen,” Cas offered, getting out of the bed. His shirt was rumpled, hair tangled, and there was something curiously bashful in his eyes.

“Hey, Cas,” Dean asked suddenly – anything to distract himself from the fact that he was wearing nothing but boxers and his shirt, and had been all this time. Not to mention _God,_ what had he said to Castiel in his sleep? “How’d you get to be so good at all that?” He waved a hand minutely. “Y’know. Human stuff. Taking care of people.” He frowned, wishing he hadn’t spoken.

Cas cocked his head to one side. “I watched you.” With that, he was gone.

 

It was a few days after that, after a day of brutal training and practice to help Dean regain his former strength. (Sam would be back from a case in a few days and Dean didn’t want him to notice anything amiss.) Dean was ready to collapse into bed, muscles aching everywhere, when he heard footsteps at his door.

“Hey Cas,” he said without turning to look. He stretched his arm out to the side, letting out a brief groan.

“Dean,” the angel returned easily.

When Dean finally turned around, Cas was standing there, practically naked without his trenchcoat, staring at him with those baby blues, a question rising up in them. Saying something like, ‘What now? What, after everything I said? Everything you said? Everything we felt in the silence? What now?’

Dean didn’t know the answer. “Cas,” he said instead. And oh, he was ready. Ready to let the words loose and let it all go. “C’mere. I’m cold.”

Cas smiled faintly and crossed the room. When he came up to Dean, hesitantly reaching out his arms to encircle Dean, Dean caught him by the shoulders, spun him around and wrapped his arms around the angel instead. He buried his face in Cas’ neck, closing his eyes and planting a single kiss there. A silent, tiny confession.

Cas fingers lifted his chin up, smoothing his eyelids down when Dean tried to open them, and kissed him, soft and slow and sweet. And Dean was bursting with everything he wanted to say, his heart thrumming _I love you_ like a tiny hummingbird, but he could only gasp against Cas’ lips and drink him in, one glorious, boundless _what now_?


End file.
